Sunday, June 13, 2010

I've been considering getting a pet for a while. Qualifications: pint-sized, adorable, and cuddly. This leaves me with gerbils/rats (not as high up on the adorable scale), hermit crabs (at the bottom of the adorable scale), hamsters/guinea pigs (too needy), birds (they never die), and rabbits (WINNER!). I'd been obsessing over dwarf rabbits, the smallest, most cuddly of them all, until my friend Heather (of the blog Bleach Bottle Bird House) mentioned Angora rabbits:

!!! I don't think there's anything I need to say about how ridiculous this rabbit looks. So ridiculous, in fact, that it's pawing away at my heart, asking for me to love it. AND asking for me to comb it regularly and spin its fur into delightful knit goods.

You mention "angora" to a knitter, and we swoon. It's one of those luxurious fibers we dream of using, but it tends to form a fuzzy halo once it's worked up (like my hair, thanks Puerto Rico). According to Alpaca Farm Girl, though, knitting it with another fiber reduces the fuzziness, shedding, AND pilling. She also says the fur on these bad boys is 6-8 TIMES WARMER than wool, and feels even more heavenly.

1 comment:

AHHHHHHHHH THOSE BUNS ARE TOO ADORABLE YOU HAVE TO DO IT! Donut could bro out with them! Also, if you want to get super environmental and you don't have access to outdoor space for a compost bucket/pile, etc, depending on what kind of bedding you use you could just throw all of it into an indoor compost machine or a worm composter and that will be SICK AMAZING fertilizer. Ahhhhh I want one too! I can't wait until you move close by!